Overeducated, Underemployed

Hey everyone! Long time no type! I would like to say my absence has been because I’ve been SO BUSY with all the EXCITING THINGS in my life, but that would just be a lie and I want to keep this friendship ON THE LEVEL. One thing I HAVE been up to, however, is getting back into crochet! I started crocheting a few years ago because I got obsessed with Japanese stuffed animals called amigurumi. I’ve been making them intermittently since then, between knitting scarves and hats and stuff. Recently I saw some amigurumi that were really inspiring, though, and I’ve gotten back into it full force. Here’s a few pics of some recent creations, all from the HIGHLY RECOMMENDED Creepy Cute Crochet by Christen Haden, A.K.A. NeedleNoodles.

Little death man! He’s so cute I could just eat him. He was my first project from this book so he’s the roughest around the edges. He’s also accidentally done with the wrong side of the crochet facing outward, because I am apparently an idiot and had been doing it the wrong way for THREE YEARS. Oh well. I might make up a little tutorial later to show you how I was making the mistake, so you can correct yourself if you’re doing the same! It’s what I get for teaching myself how to do stuff from the internet, gah.

Devil guy! My second project, also crocheted with the wrong side facing out, but overall more polished. I see you asking yourself, “Where did Sarah get those charming button eyes?” Well I MADE THEM. With Polymer Clay that I got from Michael’s and then fired in the oven! Pretty cool, right? I love that each one is unique, it makes the little guy somehow creepier AND cuter! I also made the little scythe that goes with the Death doll above.

And now my favorite guy by far: the Knight! I love all his little pieces. It took a while to get him all stitched together to my liking, but it was so worth it. He’s also my first completed piece with the correct side facing out! I’m sooo proud. You can see a few more photos of him and the other monsters in various stages of completion on my Flickr and Ravelry.

Today has been pretty blah so far, am I right? Today is Thursday, which in some days is the WORST day of the week, because it’s so close to Friday but it’s NOT Friday, you know what I mean? And the weather is getting colder and you know you have a bunch of work to do but you just haven’t done it and don’t FEEL LIKE doing it, and it’s hard to light that fire under your butt and get it done, so you’re just sitting there at your desk with your chin on your hand waiting for something to happen. I totally understand, I really do. And that’s why I’m leaving this here for you. No, go on, take it. I insist. I promise it will help you feel better!

So it’s no big secret that the movies opening this weekend really suck. Okay, the Debt looks like it could be pretty good, but I’m not running screaming to the theaters to see it. In fact instead of seeing a new movie, I went and saw Fright Night tonight. What’s up sexy hilarious Colin Farrell vampire and David Tennant in leather pants?

After I left the movie theater, I got to watch a new movie trailer and fill out a survey about it for Nielsen. The trailer they picked for me was for the upcoming biopic of my favorite cross-dressing racist, J. Edgar Hoover. It looked pretty good, although nothing new—definitely had a Frost/Nixon-y kind of vibe—and it definitely was too subtle with the gay stuff. Don’t they know the whole reason I watch movies is to figure out who’s secretly gay? (Answer: EVERYONE!)

Unfortunately that trailer isn’t up on Youtube yet, so I can’t show you what I’m talking about. Here are a few that are, though!

Good morning everybody. Sorry I’m not my usual exclamation point-fueled self today, but there’s something wrong with my CPAP machine. You see, I’m a cyborg. Whereas you can probably sleep normally without the aid of a computer, when I sleep I need air constantly pushed through my nose or I else I stop breathing. Don’t worry, it’s not for good! When I stop breathing I wake myself back up. So before I had the CPAP (which was a large chunk of my life, by the way), I never in my life got a good night’s rest. Now that I HAVE experienced this thing called “sleep,” I find it very hard to do without. And for some ridiculous reason, my CPAP has been malfunctioning for the past two nights.

So if I nod off, just give me a poke! This guy knows what I’m talking about.

Doctor Who? Isn’t that that weird and terrible sixties sci-fi show from England! Yes it is! It’s also the longest-running science fiction program ever! And most of it is pretty bad! But the latest run by Stephen Moffatt is NOT bad, it is in fact QUITE GOOD and VERY ENTERTAINING. It is my second favorite TV show on right now (the first is Breaking Bad, duh!).

This episode is picking up mid-season, so you have some catching up to do. I suggest dropping whatever you’re doing, running to your Netflix Instant queue, and immediately watching all of Doctor Who Season 5 and the first half of 6 if they have it. If that’s NOT what you’re into, let me catch you up:

The Doctor is an alien called a Time Lord, and he flies around space and time fixing problems in his police telephone box space ship (the TARDIS). Along the way he picks up spunky human girls (companions) so they can be spunky and help him solve the time crimes. Anyway, this time he kind of has TWO companions, a Scottish fireball named Amy and her goofy husband Rory. At the end of the last episode, we found out they had a TIME BABY and she grows up in the future (past?) to be the Doctor’s awesome love interest, River Song! Also, the whole premise of this season is that in the first episode, a future version of the Doctor takes them all on a picnic and shows them his death at the hands of a creepy astronaut in a lake. But here’s the catch: he makes them SWEAR not to tell his present version about his pending doom! So at this point Amy, Rory and River all know how the Doctor dies, but they can’t tell him! Yeah! Drama, right?

If that’s not enough to get you excited, here is the promo for today’s episode: “Let’s Kill Hitler.” Yeah. Best show ever.

Hey everyone, how’s your Tuesday going? Mine is going pretty well. My building maintenance guy is trying to fix my sink right now though. I always feel SO AWKWARD whenever someone comes to my house to do a job. I’m like should I pay more attention to you? Less? Is it polite or creepy to offer refreshments? What is happening ahhhhh WHEN WILL YOU LEAVE SO I CAN TAKE MY PANTS BACK OFF???

Anyway to take my mind off of the soul-crushing anxieties of fix-it guy etiquette, I’m featuring the Saturday Morning Historical Reenactment Society, a community dedicated to reliving our collective childhoods, given we grew up in the eighties. Here’s an excerpt from their info page:

This community is dedicated to the planning, coordinating and execution of our Virtual Saturday Morning Cartoon Viewing Party! Kind of like a Civil War Re-enactment Society, only with less guns and more Cookie Crisp cereal.

How freaking cool is that? Some of the shows are a little before my time, but there are plenty there that have me in full-blown acid flashback nostalgia mode. I am basically the William S. Burroughs of Hulk Hogan’s Rock ‘N Wrestling right now.

If you sign up to the community, you can vote on such important topics as Best 80’s Breakfast Cereal (there are four entire polls dedicated to this) and Best Smurfs Season (out of nine… there were nine seasons of the Smurfs), or you can hang out in the fan page of your favorite show. It takes a Livejournal account to sign up, which you should already have if you are a 47 year old craft wiccan or a middle school-aged girl in 2001.* Regardless of whether or not you do that, you should still swing back for the big event on Saturday, September 3rd. The community will be hosting a Youtube playlist from 6am to 1pm with nonstop 80’s tv action! No pausing is allowed, as included in the lineup are numerous 80’s commercials to allow for potty breaks and ultimate nostalgia power.

Okay, okay, I admit it. There is ONE upside to living in New York rather than Chicago, and it can be found in this video.

You’re downtown videotaping strangers engaged in a fight—you know, like you do.* People who are obviously better than you are trying to break up the fight rather than just watch it and cackle. ALL OF A SUDDEN, a hero in a stripey muscle shirt bursts onto the scene and stops the fight almost immediately. Who is this person, you ask? Is it a tow-truck driver? Rahm Emanuel? No! You’re not in Chicago.** You’re in New York, and it’s Ryan f*ing Gosling!

*WHO DOES THIS?

**Also, logistically, Rahm Emanuel would be IN the fight, not breaking it up.